The Wolfman (2010)

These kind of reviews are the hardest when you have mixed feelings of the movie you just watched. Was THE WOLFMAN the movie I saw last night the film I was expecting to see since it's production began in I believe 2007? I'm leaning toward no. Did I hate the movie I saw last night? Only in regards to that the movie seemed to have a lot of stuff cut out of it. I'm not talking about gore or anything like that, I am talking about that it just seems a lot of content was trimmed down, way down. This could have been the result of a studio taking to much control and the fact the film started with one director and ended with another. The short version of that story is the first director left due to “budget” reasons so the studio hired someone else but this director didn't quite have the same vision of what the first director intended the film to be. You can learn more about this on the Internet I'm sure, the bottom line is that THE WOLFMAN film was a end result of too many cooks in the kitchen. I should give Universal Pictures the benefit of doubt but I won't, they are to blame on this one.

Since the 90's Hollywood has been revamping the Movie Monsters and so far only a few times has it worked. DRACULA (92) directed by Francis Ford Coppola worked for me but FRANKENSTEIN (94) directed by Kenneth Branagh was a disaster. I have not seen WOLF(94) but I've heard that I really don't need to. In 1999 THE MUMMY was a good fun Universal Movie Monster adventure but the squeals ended that ride real quick. Then the ultimate was set to be unleashed with VAN HELSING (04) but what we got was with this film was a director who was like a kid with A.D.D in a candy store. In 2007 we were to get THE WOLFMAN but conflicts got in the way and the end result was what came out last night. THE WOLFMAN indeed has some problems but I really like it for the fact that it's scary and yes bloody. It is light years away from VAN HELSING and thats a great thing.

Lawrence returns home after receiving a letter that his brother is missing. When he gets home it is discovered that his brother was slain by some beast believed to be a bear. Some locals are convinced that the wild beast was a bear but some believe that the attack was done by something else, something like a wolf man. During a night of trying to hunt and kill whatever killed his brother Lawrence gets bitten by the beast itself. Thus begins the dark transformation of Lawrence but what will drive him to the point of insanity first, his estranged relationship with his father, or the curse of the Lycan?

As weak of a film THE WOLFMAN is I will say it does deliver on what a fan would want, gore, blood,atmosphere, and great looking werewolf wolf man. If your a die hard fan take in a afternoon theater matinée and skip the full price. Enjoy!

--Caleb